QAMISHLI: Syria’s Kurdish authorities said Thursday they were delaying controversial municipal elections which prompted threats from arch-foe Turkiye and concerns from their main ally the United States.
The elections, originally scheduled for June 11 and now postponed “until at least August,” would be the first to extend to all seven regions under the semi-autonomous region’s control, home to both Arabs and Kurds, since Syria’s fragmentation during its civil war.
The elections commission said they delayed the vote “in response to requests from political parties and alliances” who complained the campaign period was too short.
Local officials and candidates insist the elections are crucial for local representation and will help improve public services in the region.
But their detractors have accused them of separatism and monopolizing power or voiced concerns that the conditions for fair and free elections are nonexistent in Syria’s Kurdish-held northeast.
Around 18 parties, including the ruling Democratic Union Party (PYD), as well as independents are expected to run in the vote, PYD co-chair Saleh Muslim told AFP.
He said the elections had been delayed for “internal” reasons, but added “perhaps the elections commission also took the political circumstances into account.”
Syria’s Kurds, who have suffered decades of marginalization and oppression by Syria’s ruling Baath party, have come to rule about a quarter of Syria, including Arab majority areas, after government forces withdrew.
The armed wing of the PYD is the powerful People’s Protection Units (YPG) that dominates the Syrian Democratic Forces — the region’s de facto army.
The Kurdish-led forces spearheaded the fight to dislodge the Daesh group from its last Syrian territorial bastion in 2019 with American support.
But Turkiye views the PYD and YPG as offshoots of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK), which it has outlawed as a “terrorist” group.
Ankara, which controls two border strips in Syria’s north, views the upcoming polls as evidence of separatism.
Since 2016, Turkiye has carried out successive ground operations to expel Kurdish forces from border areas of northern Syria, with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan threatening to launch a new operation to prevent the election from taking place.
He described the vote as an “aggressive action against the territorial integrity” of Ankara and Damascus “under the pretext of an election.”
On Thursday, Turkish state television TRT welcomed the decision to delay the vote, adding “Turkiye’s position has borne fruit.”
The Kurdish polls have also drawn the ire of their main backer Washington, which counts Turkiye as a key NATO ally.
“Any elections that occur in Syria should be free, fair, transparent, and inclusive,” said US State Department spokesman Vedant Patel in a statement last week.
“We don’t think that the conditions for such elections are in place in NE Syria,” he said, adding the US had urged local authorities “not to proceed with elections.”
Syria’s Kurds delay controversial local elections
https://arab.news/wfprk
Syria’s Kurds delay controversial local elections
- The elections commission said they delayed the vote “in response to requests from political parties and alliances” who complained the campaign period was too short
Lufthansa halts night flights to and from Beirut due to Middle East situation
The spokesperson said the change had begun on June 29 and that daytime flights would operate as before.
Swiss International Air Lines, a Lufthansa Group subsidiary, also said it would move its Beirut night flights to the daytime until the end of July “due to the political developments at the border between Lebanon and Israel.”
The airlines did not give detailed information about the nature of the threat.
In March, the Lebanese government said it would file an urgent complaint with the UN Security Council over Israel’s alleged disruption of its navigation systems that it said affected the safety of civil aviation in the airspace of Beirut’s Rafic Hariri International Airport.
Swiss International Air Lines on Monday said the change in its schedule was not related to any potential GPS interference on its aircraft flying to Beirut.
“Our pilots are trained to handle any such situations and our aircraft have several other systems on board when one system is no longer to be trusted,” a spokesperson for Swiss said.
Previously its crews did not stay overnight in Lebanon after flying from Zurich, but instead stayed on board the aircraft when preparing for the return flight, the spokesperson added.
Egypt’s renewable power ambitions face grid hurdle
- Officials touted Egypt’s potential in wind and solar power as well as green hydrogen at a two-day Egypt-EU investment conference
CAIRO: Egypt wants to accelerate the provision of renewable energy that could ease electricity shortages and supply green power to Europe, but faces challenges in funding updates to its grid and unlocking investments for new wind and solar plants.
Officials touted Egypt’s potential in wind and solar power as well as green hydrogen at a two-day Egypt-EU investment conference in Cairo at the weekend, hoping to secure financing and benefit from Europe’s efforts to diversify and decarbonize its energy supplies.
“I think this industry represents the future for both sides,” Egyptian Prime Minister Mostafa Madbouly told the conference, adding that Egypt should manufacture renewable components such as solar panels, wind turbines and electrolyzers.
Electricity Minister Mohamed Shaker said Egypt was reviewing its clean energy targets and would aim for a 58 percent share of renewables in power generation by 2040.
He said that since 2014, Egypt had spent more than 116 billion Egyptian pounds ($2.42 billion at current exchange rates) on upgrading its transmission network, as it looked to expand into renewables.
“We are ready with the infrastructure,” said Shaker, adding that the government was offering several incentives to investors and could get approvals from President Abdel Fattah El-Sisi to raise the maximum heights for wind turbines from the ground to the tip of their blades to 220 meters from 150 meters.
Expansion of installed renewable capacity largely plateaued after the inauguration of the major Benban solar plant in 2019, according to data from Egypt’s New and Renewable Energy Authority (NREA), putting in doubt an earlier target of 42 percent of power generation through renewables by 2030.
Less than 12 percent of Egypt’s installed capacity of nearly 60GW is from renewables, the data shows.
Most power is generated by gas, and a gas shortage has contributed to daily power cuts that were extended to three hours last week, as well as causing outages at fertilizer and chemicals factories.
Egypt has signed many MoUs for renewable energy and green hydrogen development since hosting the COP 27 climate summit in 2022. It has ambitions to export electricity to regional neighbors, as well as to Europe through a subsea cable to Greece.
But analysts say Egypt needs to adapt and extend its grid to the sites of potential projects to make them viable.
“We have a shortage in fuel today which means we have the power cuts, which makes more renewables the sensible way forward ... but these need to be connected (to the grid) and this is where the challenge is,” said Hamza Assad, Southern and Eastern Mediterranean climate strategy head for the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD), which is helping finance Egypt’s energy transition.
When those connections, or transmission lines, might be built is unclear, partly because of a cap on public investments imposed this year to contain Egypt’s heavy debt burden, people with knowledge of the sector said. An Egyptian cabinet spokesman did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Grid development would cost billions in the longer term if major scaling up and the needs of green hydrogen is included, though needs this year would be a fraction of this, said Heike Harmgart, EBRD’s managing director for the region.
Kuwait gives Yemen’s national airline three aircraft, two engines
- The agreement, after a request from the chair of Yemen’s Presidential Leadership Council, comes days after the Houthis seized four of Yemenia’s aircraft
- Prisoner-exchange talks between government and Houthis continue; judge held by militia for 5 months says group attacked his home, terrorized his family
AL-MUKALLA: Kuwait has agreed to provide Yemenia, Yemen’s national air carrier, with three aircraft and two engines to supplement its limited fleet, days after the Houthis seized four of the airline’s planes.
Yemen’s government said authorities in Kuwait notified the Yemeni embassy in Kuwait on Sunday that they have agreed to a request from Rashad Al-Alimi, chairperson of Yemen’s Presidential Leadership Council, to assist Yemenia.
“This generous support adds to the lengthy legacy of the State of Kuwait’s dignified positions and generous humanitarian interventions at different stages and situations alongside our Yemeni people,” Al-Alimi said in a message posted on social media platform X.
Yemenis responded on social media with praise for Kuwait and hopes that the aircraft will allow Yemenia to provide flights to new locations or step up services to existing destinations. Yemenia offers flights to Jeddah, Riyadh, Amman, Cairo and Delhi, and plans to add services to Dubai and Kuwait.
The assistance from Kuwait came less than a week after Yemenia reported that the Houthis seized four of seven aircraft at Sanaa airport, preventing them from flying pilgrims to and from Saudi Arabia. The Yemeni government said at least 1,000 pilgrims were stranded in Saudi Arabia as a result.
The Houthis refused to release the aircraft and said last week that they would take administrative control of Yemenia, seize repair facilities at Sanaa Airport, and reschedule flights from Sanaa and other airports in Yemen, including those held by the Yemeni government.
Meanwhile, prisoner-exchange discussions between the Yemeni government and the Houthis continued on Monday for a second day without any reports of progress being made toward a fresh agreement that might result in hundreds of war detainees being freed.
“The discussions are ongoing and intense,” Yahya Kazman, the head of the Yemeni government delegation involved in the talks, told Arab News.
Abdul Wahab Qatran, a prominent, outspoken judge who was released from a Houthi prison on June 12, said that members of the group had attacked his home, terrorized his family and imprisoned him for months for exposing Houthi corruption and denouncing the actions of the militia.
“What happened to me and my whole family is terrible. No judge in Yemen’s history has ever experienced this,” he said in his first public statement since his release.
In a lengthy message posted on his son’s Facebook page on Sunday night, accompanied by a photograph of himself with tape covering his mouth, Qatran said more than 40 armed Houthis and six female intelligence agents surrounded his home in Sanaa on Jan. 2 while he his family slept, before breaking down doors and entering.
The judge said he and his family were held for hours as the Houthis looted the house. They took paperwork, cell phones, laptops, a hard drive containing 17 years of family memories, and other electronic devices including those belonging to his children.
“They stole my passport, my personal and judicial cards, my lawyer’s cards, as well as all my books and notebooks, including the notebook where I wrote down the passwords to my emails, Facebook and Twitter accounts,” Qatran added.
He said the Houthis ignored his pleas for them to respect his position as a judge and the immunity that should come with it and added: “They abducted me and threw me into an armored truck, along with my two adult children. The females put my wife and children under house arrest in a room and then occupied my home for eight hours.”
The Houthis took him to a jail in Sanaa, he said, and initially held him in isolation there for 40 days. Before releasing him this month, the Houthis ordered him to make a written pledge not to “undermine security and stability” and said he should notify their intelligence and security authorities if he needed a new cellphone SIM card.
“They have not returned any of the looted items to me yet,” he said. “They still have my phones and those of my children and relatives.”
Libya fully reopens major Ras Ajdir border crossing with Tunisia
- After calm returned to the region, the border crossing was partially reopened in mid-June
TRIPOLI: Libya’s interior minister in Tripoli said the major border crossing at Ras Ajdir with Tunisia was fully reopened on Monday three months after being shut due to armed clashes.
After calm returned to the region, the border crossing was partially reopened in mid-June though just for humanitarian and medical cases as well as special cases with permits from the Tunisian and Algerian interior ministries.
A number of ambulances from the Libyan side were seen heading into Tunisia during the reopening ceremony attended by the interior minister of Tripoli-based Government of National Unity, Emad Trabulsi, and his Tunisian counterpart Khaled Nouri.
“Two hours after this ceremony, Libyan citizens will be able to go to Tunisia,” Trabulsi told journalists at the crossing.
Nouri said the crossing had been “reopened for all activities except smuggling.”
Ras Ajdir is the main frontier crossing in Libya’s west, often used by Libyans to go to Tunisia for medical treatment and Tunisian traders moving goods in the opposite direction.
Libya has enjoyed little peace since a 2011 uprising and is split between eastern and western factions, with rival administrations governing each area. The GNU, which controls Tripoli and northwestern parts of Libya, is recognized internationally but not by the eastern-based parliament.
Trabulsi called on Libyans living near the western border to support regional security forces “in order to combat smuggling and illegal migration.”
He said Libya would open two new border crossings with Tunisia “if capabilities are provided.” Besides Ras Ajdir, the two countries have a minor crossing at Wazen-Dhehiba that has remained open.
Lebanon army receives additional $20 million from Qatar in support to troops
- Support comes at a crucial time, with the Israeli military and Hezbollah trading fire across Lebanon’s southern border in parallel with the Gaza war
BEIRUT: The Lebanese army has received an additional $20 million from Qatar in support of Lebanese troops, Lebanon’s state agency NNA said on Monday.
The support comes at a crucial time, with the Israeli military and the Lebanese armed group Hezbollah trading fire across Lebanon’s southern border in parallel with the Gaza war. The Lebanese army is not involved in the hostilities but one Lebanese soldier was killed by Israeli shelling in December.
A security source told Reuters that the new Qatari aid was a continuation of an earlier $60 million package announced in 2022 that was distributed in instalments to soldiers to support their salaries.
The source said $100 would be distributed to each soldier every month.
A five-year economic meltdown has slashed the value of the Lebanese pound against the dollar, driving down most soldiers’ wages to less than $100 per month.
The amount is barely enough to afford a basic subscription to a generator service that could offset the 22-hour cuts in the state electricity grid.
To supplement their low salaries, many troops have taken extra jobs and some have quit, raising concerns that the institution — one of few in Lebanon that can rally national pride and create unity across its fractured sectarian communities — could be fraying.
